August 8, 2024 • 35 mins
We all have our dream bucket list hunt that we feel may always be out of our reach. Today we're talking to Jana Waller from Carbon TV's, Skullbound Chronicles, who recently returned from a 10 day long bucket list hunt with her husband in interior Alaska. Jana shares two great stories about the hunt, it's a nail biter!! We know you'll enjoy this one, stay classy and keep guarding the gate!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:10):
Welcome to the Bear Hunting magazine Hunt Cast. With me
Koby Moorehead. We're gonna nerd out on bears hunting and
the outdoors. We'll tell stories, talk biology, tactics, gear, and
the fight to protect the pursuits that we hold dear, So,
grab your bino's, lace up your boots, load up your barrels,
and gather the hounds as we venture on this journey together.
(00:39):
Welcome to this here episode of the Bear Hunting magazine
hount Cast. Let me ask you a question. Do you
have a dream hunt?
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Of course you didn't.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
We all have a once in a lifetime adventure that
we would all love to do. What Today we're talking
to Janah Waller from the school Bound Chronicles on Carbon
TV about her tagging along with her husband on his
dream hunt, which happens to be her dream hunt too. Anyways,
(01:12):
we're talking with Jenna about her recent inter your Grizzly
hunt in Alaska. This has been a really good spring
for Jenna. This hunt in Alaska was her fourth bear
hunt this spring. She is a bear hunting fanatic and
the hunt just before this trip to Alaska, she was
(01:32):
able to get a bear that she had been after
for years that they nicknamed a Pooh. I didn't get
the reference because I haven't watched the Simpsons. But a
Pooh is actually a character on the Simpsons. So if
you didn't know that, you're in good company here. I
think I was just sheltered as a child. And then
(01:55):
I also didn't have cable, you know, life in the Sticks.
We're gonna start out with Jana talking briefly about her
successful hunt in Idaho, and then we're going to jump
right into her Alaskan hunt. If you haven't done so yet,
go over to our website and check out our new
(02:16):
Rope Bear Hunt magazine. Hat you need it. I just
don't know it yet. Go check it out, add it
to your card, and then check out. All right, here's Jenna.
Speaker 3 (02:39):
I ran over and I helped Heath refresh one of
our Idaho baits. Heath being my business partner, my cameraman,
and my baiting partner over the last decade.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
Good morning, we got there.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
Actually the next morning we went in and checked a
bait that he had set our favorite spot and on
trail camera there he was otherwise known as Fatty.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
Over the previous years, he got.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Renicknamed to a Pooh because he came in at seven
to eleven. But this is our target bear that we've
been after for we think three maybe four years. It
can be hard to tell because he's solid black. He
doesn't really have any distinct features. But so it was
exciting that he was on camera showing up in daylight.
But I was focused on Montana for that week. We
(03:21):
came to the end of the week and I decided
to go back to Idaho and do a sit with Heath.
Just because a Pooh was on camera, we had to sit.
No bears showed up, even the four that we had
on camera. Went back hunting Montana one last day, went
back to Idaho two days later, and we were just
going to sit all afternoon because a blizzard was coming in.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
You know.
Speaker 3 (03:43):
At last twenty five minutes a light. Heath taps me
on the shoulder and says, it's a Pooh.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
And my heart just like Winkery.
Speaker 3 (03:49):
I mean literally, I could say I thought this bear
was going to hear my heart pound out of my chest.
So he was ten yards from the bait, just behind it,
kind of behind a tree. It took him eighteen minutes
from when we first saw him to comfortably come into
the bait and as those eighteen minutes were ticking on,
you can iragine by adrenaline and I'm pistol hunting with
(04:09):
my magnum research, my BFR Biggest Finest Revolver, my thirty
thirty and long story short in Walk to Poo gave
me the perfect shot. That episode was just released last
month on Skullbung Chronicles on Carbon TV, and yeah, it
was awesome. And then I headed out to the interior
(04:30):
of Alaska on my number one bucket list hunt of
my life.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
It was interior Grizzlies with my husband John.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
John had the idea and had put money down on
this hunt beeat you know wait long before we were
even married. Well, as he was super committed to it,
I wanted to at least take long and go. And
then I started talking to Lance, the outfitter, and I said, well,
how much would a cost if I go? And we
kind of be a two on one, and he gave
me a great deal because he was already gonna be
(05:06):
hunting with John. You know, John's up first kind of thing,
and the logistics of this style hunt is a little
bit tougher than other hunts. It took us four airplane
flights to get there. You're very dependent on the weather
to get out in the cub you take. We took
a flight from Salt Lake City to Anchorage, Anchorage to
the village of Coots of You. From the village Ofcots
(05:27):
of You, you take a four or six seater plane
out to the gravel bar and then one by one
you get shuffled by a cub pilot into camp. Kind
of you're you're dropped off at the top of a mountain,
about forty five minute hike on the rims of the mountains,
where you then kind of just drop over into a
little dip in.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
The mountain to where base camp is.
Speaker 3 (05:46):
And base camp is merely three pup tents and we
would literally spend ten days living out of our you know, backpacks.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
You got to take everything you need.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
It's just such a different style hunt because once you
get dropped off by the every single thing.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
You need is on your back, not food.
Speaker 3 (06:03):
Food was already there, and mostly the food was you know,
freeze dried meals and stuff that the outfitter had.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
I had fifty one pounds on my back as.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
We headed to camp, and you can't hunt the first
day when you fly and we saw four bears that night,
which was super fun.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
Gets so excited. You know, it's just jaw droppingly beautiful
and you're in the middle of nowhere.
Speaker 3 (06:26):
It was the kind of hunt where you spent a
lot of days just glassing, which can get you a
little stir crazy. You know, you're not hiking and moving,
but when you do decide to drop off the mountain
after a bear's it was some of the most challenging
terrain that I've ever hunted in. This is tundra, so
you take a step and sink, take a step, sink.
You know, it's hard to walk in and it was
(06:48):
incredibly steep, and it was challenging in ways that not
only the terrain and the hiking and the physical challenging.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
You know, you're sleeping on the ground. It was super
cold at night.
Speaker 3 (06:59):
You're dealing with either super bad mosquitoes or sharp cold winds.
Like you're glad the wind is there and it's kind
of biting me in the face, but then the mosquitoes
aren't there, so it's kind of a give and take.
The only night that was really bad on the Mosquitos
was the night that John killed, which was day six
of the hunt.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
Another crazy thing about this hunt was that in this
particular time of year, you have almost twenty four hours
of daylight. It gets a little dim around the two
to three am time of day, but you can still
glass even in that, and so the days start to
run together. On either day four or day five, they
(07:43):
finally see a boar that they think that they can
get in on for John. They get down and into position,
and somewhere between camp and Point B the boar cleared out.
So after two two and a half hour track back
up to camp, they settle back in and then on
(08:05):
day six they see another bear that they can make
a play on. We're gonna get back to it and
Janna is going to tell us the story of one
of John's best days ever. We're jumping into the story
where they've seen the bear that they're gonna go after
on day six and they decide to make a play on.
Speaker 3 (08:27):
There's Jenna, we look like a really nice bore. So
we get down to probably about two miles away from camp.
Brandon stayed on the hillside. His garbage bags were still out.
John's you know, John's up. I've got the camera. We
got everything strapped to our backpacks, so we stopped for
(08:49):
a second. Lance says, okay, John, get your gun out,
rack around, Janna, get the camera off. I'm filming John
behind his shoulder. He's like, we're gonna get up to
this little ledge and they should be within four hundred yards.
We take just a couple steps and John says to Lance,
how far? And he goes fifty yards Because just as
he said that, the sow popped up fifty yards from us.
(09:12):
She dropped down and ran away, and the boar stood
up and saw us, and the wind was in our
face perfect and he, like Lance says, he's gonna come
check us out. You know, we had gone through this
scenario a lot talking in camp, and he said, boors
are super curious. If they cannot smell you, and you
they see us there are oftentimes they're gonna come check
(09:33):
you out. They want to make sure it's not another
bear taking their girlfriend away.
Speaker 2 (09:37):
Right.
Speaker 3 (09:38):
So he stands up, comes down and he's coming towards us,
and you know, every step he's probably making a yard
or two. John gets down on his knee to take
a shot, and now he's the bear's kind of behind
a little bump in the hill and in the way
the ridge line laid and Lance said, just stand up
and shoot him.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
John stands up. The bear's still coming.
Speaker 3 (09:59):
He says, wait, wait, because as he's walking he's kind
of swinging his head low. And John wants to hit
him right in the chest. And he said now, and
he hits him in the chest. He spins, runs away,
hits him again, hits him the third time, and we
just watched that bear tip over within seconds.
Speaker 2 (10:14):
It was a dead bear.
Speaker 3 (10:15):
And I can tell you this, I have never seen
my husband more excited. He tears were flowing.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
He was just so jacked up. Lance was so excited.
Speaker 3 (10:27):
John wanted in your face, you know, safe, but in
your face. We were talking about this on the flight there,
and he said, I want it in your face.
Speaker 2 (10:34):
I want it exciting, not dang. I mean, you know
you don't want.
Speaker 1 (10:41):
I love it when a plan comes together and then
after all of your hard work and all the elation
and excitement, tears of joy just come flowing out of you.
That's a perfect time to cry. It's so awesome that
John got exactly the adventure that he was after, and
(11:01):
that doesn't happen often. So they break down, John's bear,
get back to camp, and then Jenna's in the hot seat.
Jenna does not want the same type of adventure that
John had, Like it was cool, but she wants to
be just a little bit further out. She would prefer
a feather shot prone bear, not know you're there kind
(11:24):
of a scenario and spoiler alert, She's gonna get that,
but there's gonna be some struggles. Here's Jenna talking about
her bear and everything that led up to it. This
is a great story. You're gonna want to stay tuned.
Here's Jenna.
Speaker 2 (11:47):
Day seven.
Speaker 3 (11:48):
Now, we got back to camp at like three in
the morning. It started to rain and downpour, but luckily
most of that rain came when we were getting a
few hours of sleep. But we up to heavy, heavy
fog and what y'all, there is nothing to do there
except go to the cook tent, make some hot chocolate coffee,
share hunting stories. And there wasn't a day that would
(12:08):
buy that. We didn't see bears. It's just comes down
to can you make a play on them. It was
on the evening of day eight, it was probably one
in the morning. I looked up behind me on the
ridge and the spotting scope was not down like it
had been all week in the river bottom, you know,
this side of the river looking for a bear. Lance
(12:31):
was standing behind it, looking on the opposite mountain, on
the top of the opposite mountain across the river, and
my heart.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
Was like, uh oh, why is he?
Speaker 3 (12:39):
Like I've literally not even been glassy over there, like
at all, Like why glass over there? Except I had
asked him on day one of the hunt, Lance, have
you ever had to cross that river down there? And
he said, oh, only once and it did not go well.
He said, we got all the way over there and
you know, you're freezing wet. You know, it's way above
your belt loop, and we lost the bear. And yeah,
(13:01):
just one time in like fifteen twenty years. So I
wasn't even planning on, you know, ever needing to go
over there. I heard him whistle at John, and so
I went up there and I'm like, what are you
looking at? And Lance says, I'm looking at your bear,
And I'm like, why are you looking.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
On the other mountain?
Speaker 3 (13:18):
And he said, well, that bear's going to have to,
you know, make some changes. He's gonna have to come
over here. But we're going to keep an eye on him.
It looks like a really good bear. And it was
three miles across birds eyeing across to where we were
looking at that bear. And he said, you guys need
to go to sleep. You need to get a few
hours of sleep out. We're gonna keep an eye on
(13:38):
the bear all night. We'll see what happens, and we'll
make a game plan in the morning. I literally went
to bed praying, please, Lord, please let them cross the river.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
Please.
Speaker 3 (13:47):
The reason being is this is a freezing river. I
know me, I have horrible balance, horrible balance. I was
so afraid of crossing this raging river, slipping up, going
completely under, getting hyperthermic, you know, ruining our camera gear,
like all the things that you are afraid that might happen.
(14:18):
About six am, we are get up, folks, Get up,
Get up. We're going after your bear. And we grow
groggy and everything. We get ready. We go over to
the cooked tent. Lance looks at me and says, I
need for you to promise me you're not going to
get hypothermia. And I said, how does one promise not
to get hypothermia? And he said, you have to trust me,
(14:39):
And I said, what does that mean? Exactly, and I
had said literally, I could tell after hunting with Lance
for a few days, like if he told me to
go into the den, I would go into the den.
I'm following this guy, and I'm taking his direction whatever
he says. And he said, if we cross that river,
you're not gonna be able to feel your legs.
Speaker 2 (14:55):
When you get out.
Speaker 3 (14:56):
You're gonna want to sit down, You're gonna want to
try to warm up. You have got to keep moving.
We have got to hike to the top of the
mountain on the other side. By then you'll probably be
mostly dry. We can take a break and warm up,
but we can't stop when we get to the other side.
I said, okay, whatever, if you think I could do that, okay.
So we got our gear on we headed off the mountain.
(15:17):
It took us like two hours plus to get down,
just to get down to the river.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
Brandon hiked halfway down.
Speaker 3 (15:24):
The mountain with us and then stayed and was going
to signal with the white garbage bags.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
And we just got ready.
Speaker 3 (15:31):
There's not much to do except we put some of
the rain the camera gear into bags, zip block bakes
and waterproof bakes. That's all in John's pack. I grab
Lance's arm and you just walk with me, lean on
me if you have to, we're gonna you could kind
of see your footing. But when it got super deep,
it was to me it was like way about a
foot above my belt.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
I couldn't really.
Speaker 3 (15:51):
See the bottom, and my instinct wanted to go the
shortest way, but Lance was right, you've got to go
with the flow of the river, so you're literally loading
kind of down the river, you know, even instead of
taking the shortest route. But we got to the other
side just find John crossed perfect behind us on our line,
and he's right. I did want to just stop and
(16:13):
like get my breath and figure something out because it
just feels so weird to be all soaking wet, your
boots are sloshy.
Speaker 2 (16:19):
But we hiked all the.
Speaker 3 (16:20):
Way up to the other side of mountain and it
was super steep, like in one part, the kind where
you've got to grab onto the shrubbery, you know, bushes,
just to get some traction. And we got up to
the other side and he was right. By then it
was another hour or two. We were mostly dry. The
only thing that's wet are your boots. So we took
our wet boots off, take your wet socks off, dry
(16:42):
your feet out in a while, you know, kind of
rub them. Try now, mind you, it's like forty degrees out.
It's not freezing cold, but it's still cold and the
wind is really sharp. So we dried our feet out,
put our sealskin socks on, wet boots back on. But
now there's a barrier between that your wet foot and
your boot and that was really really helpful. And so
we camped out above the bowl that we thought the
(17:04):
bears were in, and long story short, we saw one
of the grizzlies come out. We could look at Brandon
and he still had the garbage bag out, just one
meaning he could still see one bear.
Speaker 2 (17:16):
And we sat for a couple hours and this bear
would feed and sleep and feed and sleep.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
It looked to be the sow, and we thought it's
so weird, like where is the boar. Maybe he dropped
down to the river, we don't know. And all of
a sudden, Lance said, let's go, let's go. Brandon's making
a move. So we thought we were interpreting that the
bears dropped off to the river. So we get our
gear pack all everything up go back down the river
to back down the mountain towards the river, and all
(17:42):
of a sudden we stop. Lance glances back at Brandon
and he's waving and waving, and he sets the two
garbage bags way away.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
From him and runs over and is like point.
Speaker 3 (17:51):
So he's telling us that the bear we were on
were the wrong bears. There's another green bowl next to
that green bowl at the top of the mountain that
the bears are still in and have been in the
whole time. We hike back up the mountain, across the
ridge top dropping and sure enough, by then we could
glass him up. We're like six hundred yards away. There
they are, poor and sow feeding in the open green bowl.
(18:14):
We made a closer play, got to three hundred yards.
He's like, how closer you get. I'm like, this is fine,
this will work. I know this thirty nozzler. We're gonna
be good. So we got the camera out, got in
the prone. I said ready and he said ready, and
I shot. I'm not used to this, but if you
still have a shot on your grizzly, you need to
empty that gun, you know, versus you want to concentrate
(18:35):
on that first shot. But if you still see that bear,
keep firing until you are one hundred percent sure that
bear is dead.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
So I hit the.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
Bear twice three times, and he was on his back,
paw in the air. We start to celebrate a little
and boom gets up and he runs off, and we
only had a short window between some shrubs, so all
of a sudden, my celebration got dampered. And I'm like,
oh my god, because the last thing you want to
do is have your outfit or go into the brush
or trees after a wounded bear. You know, even though
(19:04):
I thought my first shot was perfect, I you know,
you're just still there's such tough animals. So we get
down there, we go into the bowl and right as
we kind of move around this little bush, there's my bear.
It probably ran twenty yards laying there. We walk up
to him, you know, hey bear, hey bear. Lance puts
the you know, tip of his rifle into the bear's eye,
(19:25):
making your dead bear. And I can't even describe to
you what this bear looked like. He's a nine foot
interior twenty five inch skull, about as big as they
come for an interior grizzly.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
He was just a beast.
Speaker 3 (19:41):
He had his scars on his nose, a big bite
mark out of his rear, old scars on his shoulder,
and he's just an old bruiser who had been beat
up many a times.
Speaker 2 (19:52):
And it was so exciting.
Speaker 3 (19:54):
You know, he is paws or the size of my
head and just to be able to get up on
him and see this magnificent animal.
Speaker 4 (20:01):
It was.
Speaker 2 (20:02):
It was so cool. It was so cool, what a bear.
Speaker 1 (20:08):
And I gotta say congrats to Jennet. That is a
crazy track to get over to where that bear was.
Whenever she was talking about what all it would take
with crossing the river and going over to where that
bear was, and how the outfitter wasn't really wanting to
go over there and has only done it once in
the past, you knew the story was going to be
(20:31):
pretty epic, and it had to be a pretty good
bear for the outfitter to be willing to go to
that area. But Congrass channel a huge bruiser. But as
most hunters know, it's not over until it's over. They
still got to break the bear down and get it
back to camp. And then now they're tagged out and
(20:53):
they got to get back home so we can go
back to Jennifer a bit, and then I got a
few questions for.
Speaker 2 (21:05):
Brandon.
Speaker 3 (21:06):
Hike back down, got to us, and what seemed to
be under an hour. The guy, the twenty seven year old,
looks like a big, huge, six foot five football player.
He's just a strapping beast of a guy. And we
got to work on the bear skinned it. You know,
when they do that, they take the skull out, and
they even take the paw bone, the handbones out, the
feet bones out, everything, every ounce of that bear out.
(21:28):
And so yet you can pack up the hide and
the skull, and you know, the hide weighs anywhere from
eighty to one hundred pounds, and it's just an incredible animal.
And so got all packed up, made our way back
down to the river, stopped to have dinner at the
river because now we're probably sixteen hours into the hunt,
into that day's hunt, and so we stopped, made a
(21:49):
peak meal at the river, had got some calories in us,
crossed back across the river. We weren't on our same
line that we crossed on, and this team it was
even a little bit deeper as we went across. But
and then just hike back up to camp and from
the time we left camp to when we got back
to camp with the bear was twenty hours.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
Yeah, it's a full day. Yeah. It was absolutely incredible.
Speaker 3 (22:13):
And then he said, as we're unloading everything, we're packing
our bear, putting our bear in the snow bank right
by camp. He said, I got good news and bad news.
The good news is we're going to get out tomorrow morning.
It's fog was coming in. We could tell that it
was going to be a really bad day ten. Day
ten was supposed to be super foggy.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
The pilot's going to come get us all. We're all
going to get out.
Speaker 3 (22:31):
The bad news is, you guys have two hours to
get some sleep and then we're packing camp and hiking
back to the airstrip. It was an adventure like none
I've ever had before. It was probably the most physically
challenging hunt in my life. This was next level. Even
though you had days where he didn't really burn a
whole lot of calories, you're sitting there glassing the whole day,
(22:51):
just the three days that we dropped off back to camp,
and it's sleeping on the ground, and it was just
it is really hard to discrubebe the epic noss for
lack of a better word, of this style of bear hunt.
I couldn't be more grateful for Lance and Brandon to
just have their knowledge and their help. And they were
so fun in camp. And you know, they've got every
(23:14):
single grizzly story that you've ever heard, they've probably witnessed themselves,
you know, and we talked about Yeah, we talked about
predation a ton because it's so misunderstood. I mean, recently,
there was an article in the Massoulian and some gale
wrote it and it was Grizzly hunting is nothing but
a trophy hunt, was the title of the article. And
(23:36):
they couldn't be any further from the truth. There's another
area in Alaska where they helicoptered eighty one grizzlies this
year because they're trying so desperately hard to save this
particular caribou herd and it you know, anyone who says
nature balances a self out is so ignorant, and it
(23:56):
simply doesn't work like that. We are a part of nature.
Definitely screwed things up in the past. It is our
responsibility to make them right, and we want all animals.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
To be here for the future.
Speaker 3 (24:09):
You know, the carib with the muskox, the reindeer, everything,
and they just need to be managed like any and
because this style hunt is really hard. Like so the
natives can come hunt grizzly anytime they want, but logistically
they don't. It's incredibly challenging. They're going to need a
plane to get in here. The only way they ever
(24:30):
get in to this area. Lance was saying, was by snowmobile.
And you know by snowmobile, they're the grizzlies are hibernating.
So it's a it's they just become overpopulated and they
need to be managed.
Speaker 2 (24:42):
And uh, yeah it was a hunt I'll never forget.
Speaker 1 (24:45):
Yeah, it sounds like a crazy adventure. And yea, John
let you John, lets you tag along.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
He let me tagle, He let me tag on. And
the funny thing is it's.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
Just dumb luck that my bear was bigger than his.
You know, I would have gladly traded. But it's funny
we're both having them fully boy, fully body mounted. He
wants right, Yeah, isn't hers? He wants upright? I want
on all fours. So yeah, we're pretty excited to get
those back next year. And yeah, you know, being being
(25:14):
a bear gal. You know, I that Grizzly was my
nineteenth bear that I've taken, obviously my first Grizzly, but
just to have that experience was amazing, and it was
I felt like, you know, a kid in a candy.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
Store just talking bears all week. You know, it was.
Speaker 3 (25:28):
Amazing and I really hope someday I might get to
do it again, maybe on Kodiak for Brown Bear. But yeah,
if anyone, I mean, you know, life is short, take
advantage of the opportunity. If you have to put money
down for five years, save a date, and start putting
money down on the hunt.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
I know they're expensive. I get it. You know, I
am not the typical sheep hunter.
Speaker 3 (25:49):
That was one I drew. I'm not the typical grizzly hunter.
They're super expensive. But life is short. If it's a
dream of yours, go after it, start saving for it.
Because I don't. I'll find it very hard to believe
that John and I could ever top that adventure.
Speaker 2 (26:04):
For the rest of our lives.
Speaker 3 (26:05):
Wherever we travel, whether it's a hunt, whether we go
to Europe, I don't think we are ever going to
be able to top that Grizzly adventure.
Speaker 1 (26:13):
Yeah, yeah, And it's one of those things that you
have to do why you can physically do it. Some
people might think that they should start on lesser adventures
and just like eventually whenever they could spend the money
or have it go and do those types of adventures.
But our bodies have a big timeline on them, you know.
Speaker 3 (26:32):
And yeah, yeah, for sure, I'm not getting any younger,
no doubt. And Lance and I are the exact same age,
So I was thinking, Okay, at least I have that
in my quarter, you know, the outfitter's diage. Oh no,
he was basically a mouth vat. He is one of
the strongest guys. He and Brandon together, we're just beasts,
and I'm I'm happy John and I survived.
Speaker 1 (26:54):
These bear outfitters. A lot of times they're just nothing
but solid muscle, you know. Also hound hunters. I mean,
those guys are incredibly in shape. You could look at
a guy and think that and think that you could
keep up with him, Like he might not have the
physique of looking like an athlete, but some of these
big old fellas can get up and stay way ahead
(27:18):
of you two, you know, like the no guys that
do it, you know, day in and day out, and
I think it's a lot of it is that harshness
of environment. You know, if you especially in the mountainous areas,
these guys running black bears with hounds, like they have
to go in to where that tree is most of
the time.
Speaker 3 (27:37):
You know, yeah, yeah, exactly, no houndsmen. Are you typically
in great shape?
Speaker 2 (27:43):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (27:43):
You know, book the hunt, and you know when you
go to a grizzly hunt, you're gonna need an outfitter.
You know, you have to legally have an outfitter with you.
And my recommendation if you're able to book a hunt
like this is to ask the outfitter for a workout regime.
You know, I John and I have a gym in
our house, would work out a ton. I still felt unprepared.
I wish so I was rocking with forty pounds on
(28:07):
my back on the treadmill. Every other day, I half
hour rucking and then lifting weights. And I probably should
have done that. Last two months before the hunt, I
probably should have done an hour a rucking just because
it was so and the tundra it's like walking through
snow banks. It's just so or on the sand anyone
knows if you're on the sand, how much more challenging
(28:28):
walking is in thick sand, not right where the waves
come in. I'm talking thick sand. That's kind of what
tundra hiking is like. And then you add on that
inclient and stuff. But I would, yeah, follow the outfitters instructions.
They've been there, done that so much. Even like I
looked at the Atlance's gearlest and even though I looked
at the gearlest, I'm like, yep, I got a sleeping pad.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
I got a sleeping bag.
Speaker 3 (28:52):
The one thing I wish I would have done and
listened to him is he had recommendations of a sleeping
pad and a sleeping bag, and I'm like, I got
my zero degree.
Speaker 2 (28:59):
Bay, I'm good. No, I was freezing.
Speaker 3 (29:03):
They use Lance and Brandon use climbing bags like for
climbers who climb Everest.
Speaker 2 (29:08):
That's next level gear.
Speaker 3 (29:10):
And he did say there's a padout I can't remember
the manufacturer, a sleeping padout that's literally four or five
inches thick, and he said it's a game changer. And
so anyway, pay attention to the outfit or what they
have to say, but life is short.
Speaker 2 (29:26):
Go after those Adventures.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
So what made you and John go after such a
difficult hunt in a for an interier grizzly because you know,
a lot of guys you could do like a boat
based hunt, like there's different. I mean, they can they
can bait for grizz up in Alaska. Two. So what
was the driver for making a decision to do a
(29:50):
really physically demanding, you know, for plane into interior.
Speaker 3 (29:56):
You're right there, there are so many different styles of grizzly. Really,
the one thing that made him want this hunt was
Lance was Lance Kromberger, the outfitter. He had met Lance
at the Wild Sheep Foundation banquet at their annual Big
you Know expo, and he started talking with him, started
(30:16):
to watch a lot of Lance's videos Free Lance Outdoors
I think is his company name, and may have some
of those on YouTube or on different channels, but started
watching those and he just wanted a true interior style
of hunt where you had to get dropped off by
a cub.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
That's the style of hunt he really wanted.
Speaker 3 (30:34):
And really, this particular outfitter we chose because John had
tons of friends who've gone with Lance in the past
and had the exact kind of experience that I just described,
and it couldn't have been any better. It really couldn't.
It was, you know, and you are at the mercy
of the weather with flying in, flying out, with glassing
(30:56):
and fog and rain that kind of thing, and I'm.
Speaker 2 (30:59):
Glad we had it all.
Speaker 3 (30:59):
We had some rain, we had some fog, we had cold,
we had a little little bit of snow showers. But
I'm kind of glad we had it all. When you
get back, it just adds to the adventure.
Speaker 4 (31:08):
You know.
Speaker 1 (31:08):
One of the most important things that I think people
overlook is camp dynamics. And so oftentimes people are focused
so much on what they can get out of the
hunt as far as like what size of bear they
can bring them back, But it's really important to find
the right outfitter that that you pretty much just jive
with because you're going to be around that person for
(31:31):
you know, in most bear hunts maybe five or six
days and they're calling the shots, like you have to
make sure that you trust them and that you know
you can take orders from them like that. They're just
you got to make sure that your personalities jive well.
And it's not just about you know what it is
(31:51):
that you're after.
Speaker 2 (31:53):
Yeah, oh, that's so important.
Speaker 3 (31:54):
Lance had brought that up actually when we were having
our conversations in the cooked tent. In that one, he
almost intervened people for the hunt he's booked up for
the next you know, I don't know how many years
on end, but he literally interviews people to see if
sort of you know, how serious they are, if they've
got what it takes to do the hunt, what their
(32:14):
expectations are. And I think he's such a veteran and
he's I'm sure sort of tailored his questioning to the
hunters as well to make sure that that there is
a good bond, like you said, that you're going to
get along, that the outfitter can meet expectations, all of that.
Speaker 1 (32:31):
You know, So whenever you and John talk about it,
like what's the the thing that comes up the most.
Speaker 3 (32:39):
Definitely in the ten days we were there nine and
a half, John's bear that in your face, Like we
talk about that every day.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
Still.
Speaker 3 (32:50):
The hit, just the way it went down was so
awesome because it was thirty six yards when he shot
his bear. He shot it at thirty six yards and
he might have ran ten yards, you know, and just
the in your face adrenaline, and it wasn't charging us,
you know, like you've seen those videos right of them.
It wasn't charging, but it was walking kind of past
(33:10):
to figure out like what we are.
Speaker 2 (33:12):
And I don't care what anybody says.
Speaker 3 (33:14):
Even though there's two guns because Lance has gone, John
has a gun, I've got the camera.
Speaker 2 (33:18):
It's still intimidating. It's still a rush.
Speaker 3 (33:21):
And so that and then the whole the last day
of my hunt to twenty hours of just crossing the river.
And you know, I've I've had my neighbors over for
dinner and they had fifty thousand questions or I've talked
to people online about it. Really a lot of the
questions had to do with like how do you warm
up after crossing the river?
Speaker 2 (33:41):
How do you get the hide and everything out? Like
do you eat the meat? You know, everything like that.
Speaker 3 (33:46):
But John and I when we're sitting in the truck
talking about the hunt, it's about they have his close
encounter and crossing the river.
Speaker 1 (33:53):
Yeah, yeah, cool. Well I think we're gonna wrap this
one up. But thanks Jenna absolutely anytime.
Speaker 2 (34:00):
Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (34:02):
All Right, that's a wrap another one down. Well, you
can watch Jana's Hunt for a Pooh, the Idaho Bated
Hunt on Carbon TV now and it will be in
the upcoming September October issue of Bear Hunting Magazine. The
Hunt with John this interior grizzly hunt will be in
(34:23):
the magazine eventually. You can catch John going after his
bear on August fifteenth on Carbon TV, and then you
can catch Jana's hunt a month later September fifteenth on
Carbon TV. I'm sure it's gonna be a great watch.
Until next time, stay classy.
Speaker 4 (34:43):
Thank you for listening. Though Bear Hunting Magazine Hunt Cast
is recorded by Bear Hunting Magazine and produced by Mountain
Gravity Media. Be sure leave us a five star review
on iTunes and keep guarding the gate.
Speaker 1 (35:01):
No
Welcome to the Bear Hunting magazine Hunt Cast. With me
Koby Moorehead. We're gonna nerd out on bears hunting and
the outdoors. We'll tell stories, talk biology, tactics, gear, and
the fight to protect the pursuits that we hold dear, So,
grab your bino's, lace up your boots, load up your barrels,
and gather the hounds as we venture on this journey together.
(00:39):
Welcome to this here episode of the Bear Hunting magazine
hount Cast. Let me ask you a question. Do you
have a dream hunt?
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Of course you didn't.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
We all have a once in a lifetime adventure that
we would all love to do. What Today we're talking
to Janah Waller from the school Bound Chronicles on Carbon
TV about her tagging along with her husband on his
dream hunt, which happens to be her dream hunt too. Anyways,
(01:12):
we're talking with Jenna about her recent inter your Grizzly
hunt in Alaska. This has been a really good spring
for Jenna. This hunt in Alaska was her fourth bear
hunt this spring. She is a bear hunting fanatic and
the hunt just before this trip to Alaska, she was
(01:32):
able to get a bear that she had been after
for years that they nicknamed a Pooh. I didn't get
the reference because I haven't watched the Simpsons. But a
Pooh is actually a character on the Simpsons. So if
you didn't know that, you're in good company here. I
think I was just sheltered as a child. And then
(01:55):
I also didn't have cable, you know, life in the Sticks.
We're gonna start out with Jana talking briefly about her
successful hunt in Idaho, and then we're going to jump
right into her Alaskan hunt. If you haven't done so yet,
go over to our website and check out our new
(02:16):
Rope Bear Hunt magazine. Hat you need it. I just
don't know it yet. Go check it out, add it
to your card, and then check out. All right, here's Jenna.
Speaker 3 (02:39):
I ran over and I helped Heath refresh one of
our Idaho baits. Heath being my business partner, my cameraman,
and my baiting partner over the last decade.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
Good morning, we got there.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
Actually the next morning we went in and checked a
bait that he had set our favorite spot and on
trail camera there he was otherwise known as Fatty.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
Over the previous years, he got.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Renicknamed to a Pooh because he came in at seven
to eleven. But this is our target bear that we've
been after for we think three maybe four years. It
can be hard to tell because he's solid black. He
doesn't really have any distinct features. But so it was
exciting that he was on camera showing up in daylight.
But I was focused on Montana for that week. We
(03:21):
came to the end of the week and I decided
to go back to Idaho and do a sit with Heath.
Just because a Pooh was on camera, we had to sit.
No bears showed up, even the four that we had
on camera. Went back hunting Montana one last day, went
back to Idaho two days later, and we were just
going to sit all afternoon because a blizzard was coming in.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
You know.
Speaker 3 (03:43):
At last twenty five minutes a light. Heath taps me
on the shoulder and says, it's a Pooh.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
And my heart just like Winkery.
Speaker 3 (03:49):
I mean literally, I could say I thought this bear
was going to hear my heart pound out of my chest.
So he was ten yards from the bait, just behind it,
kind of behind a tree. It took him eighteen minutes
from when we first saw him to comfortably come into
the bait and as those eighteen minutes were ticking on,
you can iragine by adrenaline and I'm pistol hunting with
(04:09):
my magnum research, my BFR Biggest Finest Revolver, my thirty
thirty and long story short in Walk to Poo gave
me the perfect shot. That episode was just released last
month on Skullbung Chronicles on Carbon TV, and yeah, it
was awesome. And then I headed out to the interior
(04:30):
of Alaska on my number one bucket list hunt of
my life.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
It was interior Grizzlies with my husband John.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
John had the idea and had put money down on
this hunt beeat you know wait long before we were
even married. Well, as he was super committed to it,
I wanted to at least take long and go. And
then I started talking to Lance, the outfitter, and I said, well,
how much would a cost if I go? And we
kind of be a two on one, and he gave
me a great deal because he was already gonna be
(05:06):
hunting with John. You know, John's up first kind of thing,
and the logistics of this style hunt is a little
bit tougher than other hunts. It took us four airplane
flights to get there. You're very dependent on the weather
to get out in the cub you take. We took
a flight from Salt Lake City to Anchorage, Anchorage to
the village of Coots of You. From the village Ofcots
(05:27):
of You, you take a four or six seater plane
out to the gravel bar and then one by one
you get shuffled by a cub pilot into camp. Kind
of you're you're dropped off at the top of a mountain,
about forty five minute hike on the rims of the mountains,
where you then kind of just drop over into a
little dip in.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
The mountain to where base camp is.
Speaker 3 (05:46):
And base camp is merely three pup tents and we
would literally spend ten days living out of our you know, backpacks.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
You got to take everything you need.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
It's just such a different style hunt because once you
get dropped off by the every single thing.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
You need is on your back, not food.
Speaker 3 (06:03):
Food was already there, and mostly the food was you know,
freeze dried meals and stuff that the outfitter had.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
I had fifty one pounds on my back as.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
We headed to camp, and you can't hunt the first
day when you fly and we saw four bears that night,
which was super fun.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
Gets so excited. You know, it's just jaw droppingly beautiful
and you're in the middle of nowhere.
Speaker 3 (06:26):
It was the kind of hunt where you spent a
lot of days just glassing, which can get you a
little stir crazy. You know, you're not hiking and moving,
but when you do decide to drop off the mountain
after a bear's it was some of the most challenging
terrain that I've ever hunted in. This is tundra, so
you take a step and sink, take a step, sink.
You know, it's hard to walk in and it was
(06:48):
incredibly steep, and it was challenging in ways that not
only the terrain and the hiking and the physical challenging.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
You know, you're sleeping on the ground. It was super
cold at night.
Speaker 3 (06:59):
You're dealing with either super bad mosquitoes or sharp cold winds.
Like you're glad the wind is there and it's kind
of biting me in the face, but then the mosquitoes
aren't there, so it's kind of a give and take.
The only night that was really bad on the Mosquitos
was the night that John killed, which was day six
of the hunt.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
Another crazy thing about this hunt was that in this
particular time of year, you have almost twenty four hours
of daylight. It gets a little dim around the two
to three am time of day, but you can still
glass even in that, and so the days start to
run together. On either day four or day five, they
(07:43):
finally see a boar that they think that they can
get in on for John. They get down and into position,
and somewhere between camp and Point B the boar cleared out.
So after two two and a half hour track back
up to camp, they settle back in and then on
(08:05):
day six they see another bear that they can make
a play on. We're gonna get back to it and
Janna is going to tell us the story of one
of John's best days ever. We're jumping into the story
where they've seen the bear that they're gonna go after
on day six and they decide to make a play on.
Speaker 3 (08:27):
There's Jenna, we look like a really nice bore. So
we get down to probably about two miles away from camp.
Brandon stayed on the hillside. His garbage bags were still out.
John's you know, John's up. I've got the camera. We
got everything strapped to our backpacks, so we stopped for
(08:49):
a second. Lance says, okay, John, get your gun out,
rack around, Janna, get the camera off. I'm filming John
behind his shoulder. He's like, we're gonna get up to
this little ledge and they should be within four hundred yards.
We take just a couple steps and John says to Lance,
how far? And he goes fifty yards Because just as
he said that, the sow popped up fifty yards from us.
(09:12):
She dropped down and ran away, and the boar stood
up and saw us, and the wind was in our
face perfect and he, like Lance says, he's gonna come
check us out. You know, we had gone through this
scenario a lot talking in camp, and he said, boors
are super curious. If they cannot smell you, and you
they see us there are oftentimes they're gonna come check
(09:33):
you out. They want to make sure it's not another
bear taking their girlfriend away.
Speaker 2 (09:37):
Right.
Speaker 3 (09:38):
So he stands up, comes down and he's coming towards us,
and you know, every step he's probably making a yard
or two. John gets down on his knee to take
a shot, and now he's the bear's kind of behind
a little bump in the hill and in the way
the ridge line laid and Lance said, just stand up
and shoot him.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
John stands up. The bear's still coming.
Speaker 3 (09:59):
He says, wait, wait, because as he's walking he's kind
of swinging his head low. And John wants to hit
him right in the chest. And he said now, and
he hits him in the chest. He spins, runs away,
hits him again, hits him the third time, and we
just watched that bear tip over within seconds.
Speaker 2 (10:14):
It was a dead bear.
Speaker 3 (10:15):
And I can tell you this, I have never seen
my husband more excited. He tears were flowing.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
He was just so jacked up. Lance was so excited.
Speaker 3 (10:27):
John wanted in your face, you know, safe, but in
your face. We were talking about this on the flight there,
and he said, I want it in your face.
Speaker 2 (10:34):
I want it exciting, not dang. I mean, you know
you don't want.
Speaker 1 (10:41):
I love it when a plan comes together and then
after all of your hard work and all the elation
and excitement, tears of joy just come flowing out of you.
That's a perfect time to cry. It's so awesome that
John got exactly the adventure that he was after, and
(11:01):
that doesn't happen often. So they break down, John's bear,
get back to camp, and then Jenna's in the hot seat.
Jenna does not want the same type of adventure that
John had, Like it was cool, but she wants to
be just a little bit further out. She would prefer
a feather shot prone bear, not know you're there kind
(11:24):
of a scenario and spoiler alert, She's gonna get that,
but there's gonna be some struggles. Here's Jenna talking about
her bear and everything that led up to it. This
is a great story. You're gonna want to stay tuned.
Here's Jenna.
Speaker 2 (11:47):
Day seven.
Speaker 3 (11:48):
Now, we got back to camp at like three in
the morning. It started to rain and downpour, but luckily
most of that rain came when we were getting a
few hours of sleep. But we up to heavy, heavy
fog and what y'all, there is nothing to do there
except go to the cook tent, make some hot chocolate coffee,
share hunting stories. And there wasn't a day that would
(12:08):
buy that. We didn't see bears. It's just comes down
to can you make a play on them. It was
on the evening of day eight, it was probably one
in the morning. I looked up behind me on the
ridge and the spotting scope was not down like it
had been all week in the river bottom, you know,
this side of the river looking for a bear. Lance
(12:31):
was standing behind it, looking on the opposite mountain, on
the top of the opposite mountain across the river, and
my heart.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
Was like, uh oh, why is he?
Speaker 3 (12:39):
Like I've literally not even been glassy over there, like
at all, Like why glass over there? Except I had
asked him on day one of the hunt, Lance, have
you ever had to cross that river down there? And
he said, oh, only once and it did not go well.
He said, we got all the way over there and
you know, you're freezing wet. You know, it's way above
your belt loop, and we lost the bear. And yeah,
(13:01):
just one time in like fifteen twenty years. So I
wasn't even planning on, you know, ever needing to go
over there. I heard him whistle at John, and so
I went up there and I'm like, what are you
looking at? And Lance says, I'm looking at your bear,
And I'm like, why are you looking.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
On the other mountain?
Speaker 3 (13:18):
And he said, well, that bear's going to have to,
you know, make some changes. He's gonna have to come
over here. But we're going to keep an eye on him.
It looks like a really good bear. And it was
three miles across birds eyeing across to where we were
looking at that bear. And he said, you guys need
to go to sleep. You need to get a few
hours of sleep out. We're gonna keep an eye on
(13:38):
the bear all night. We'll see what happens, and we'll
make a game plan in the morning. I literally went
to bed praying, please, Lord, please let them cross the river.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
Please.
Speaker 3 (13:47):
The reason being is this is a freezing river. I
know me, I have horrible balance, horrible balance. I was
so afraid of crossing this raging river, slipping up, going
completely under, getting hyperthermic, you know, ruining our camera gear,
like all the things that you are afraid that might happen.
(14:18):
About six am, we are get up, folks, Get up,
Get up. We're going after your bear. And we grow
groggy and everything. We get ready. We go over to
the cooked tent. Lance looks at me and says, I
need for you to promise me you're not going to
get hypothermia. And I said, how does one promise not
to get hypothermia? And he said, you have to trust me,
(14:39):
And I said, what does that mean? Exactly, and I
had said literally, I could tell after hunting with Lance
for a few days, like if he told me to
go into the den, I would go into the den.
I'm following this guy, and I'm taking his direction whatever
he says. And he said, if we cross that river,
you're not gonna be able to feel your legs.
Speaker 2 (14:55):
When you get out.
Speaker 3 (14:56):
You're gonna want to sit down, You're gonna want to
try to warm up. You have got to keep moving.
We have got to hike to the top of the
mountain on the other side. By then you'll probably be
mostly dry. We can take a break and warm up,
but we can't stop when we get to the other side.
I said, okay, whatever, if you think I could do that, okay.
So we got our gear on we headed off the mountain.
(15:17):
It took us like two hours plus to get down,
just to get down to the river.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
Brandon hiked halfway down.
Speaker 3 (15:24):
The mountain with us and then stayed and was going
to signal with the white garbage bags.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
And we just got ready.
Speaker 3 (15:31):
There's not much to do except we put some of
the rain the camera gear into bags, zip block bakes
and waterproof bakes. That's all in John's pack. I grab
Lance's arm and you just walk with me, lean on
me if you have to, we're gonna you could kind
of see your footing. But when it got super deep,
it was to me it was like way about a
foot above my belt.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
I couldn't really.
Speaker 3 (15:51):
See the bottom, and my instinct wanted to go the
shortest way, but Lance was right, you've got to go
with the flow of the river, so you're literally loading
kind of down the river, you know, even instead of
taking the shortest route. But we got to the other
side just find John crossed perfect behind us on our line,
and he's right. I did want to just stop and
(16:13):
like get my breath and figure something out because it
just feels so weird to be all soaking wet, your
boots are sloshy.
Speaker 2 (16:19):
But we hiked all the.
Speaker 3 (16:20):
Way up to the other side of mountain and it
was super steep, like in one part, the kind where
you've got to grab onto the shrubbery, you know, bushes,
just to get some traction. And we got up to
the other side and he was right. By then it
was another hour or two. We were mostly dry. The
only thing that's wet are your boots. So we took
our wet boots off, take your wet socks off, dry
(16:42):
your feet out in a while, you know, kind of
rub them. Try now, mind you, it's like forty degrees out.
It's not freezing cold, but it's still cold and the
wind is really sharp. So we dried our feet out,
put our sealskin socks on, wet boots back on. But
now there's a barrier between that your wet foot and
your boot and that was really really helpful. And so
we camped out above the bowl that we thought the
(17:04):
bears were in, and long story short, we saw one
of the grizzlies come out. We could look at Brandon
and he still had the garbage bag out, just one
meaning he could still see one bear.
Speaker 2 (17:16):
And we sat for a couple hours and this bear
would feed and sleep and feed and sleep.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
It looked to be the sow, and we thought it's
so weird, like where is the boar. Maybe he dropped
down to the river, we don't know. And all of
a sudden, Lance said, let's go, let's go. Brandon's making
a move. So we thought we were interpreting that the
bears dropped off to the river. So we get our
gear pack all everything up go back down the river
to back down the mountain towards the river, and all
(17:42):
of a sudden we stop. Lance glances back at Brandon
and he's waving and waving, and he sets the two
garbage bags way away.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
From him and runs over and is like point.
Speaker 3 (17:51):
So he's telling us that the bear we were on
were the wrong bears. There's another green bowl next to
that green bowl at the top of the mountain that
the bears are still in and have been in the
whole time. We hike back up the mountain, across the
ridge top dropping and sure enough, by then we could
glass him up. We're like six hundred yards away. There
they are, poor and sow feeding in the open green bowl.
(18:14):
We made a closer play, got to three hundred yards.
He's like, how closer you get. I'm like, this is fine,
this will work. I know this thirty nozzler. We're gonna
be good. So we got the camera out, got in
the prone. I said ready and he said ready, and
I shot. I'm not used to this, but if you
still have a shot on your grizzly, you need to
empty that gun, you know, versus you want to concentrate
(18:35):
on that first shot. But if you still see that bear,
keep firing until you are one hundred percent sure that
bear is dead.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
So I hit the.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
Bear twice three times, and he was on his back,
paw in the air. We start to celebrate a little
and boom gets up and he runs off, and we
only had a short window between some shrubs, so all
of a sudden, my celebration got dampered. And I'm like,
oh my god, because the last thing you want to
do is have your outfit or go into the brush
or trees after a wounded bear. You know, even though
(19:04):
I thought my first shot was perfect, I you know,
you're just still there's such tough animals. So we get
down there, we go into the bowl and right as
we kind of move around this little bush, there's my bear.
It probably ran twenty yards laying there. We walk up
to him, you know, hey bear, hey bear. Lance puts
the you know, tip of his rifle into the bear's eye,
(19:25):
making your dead bear. And I can't even describe to
you what this bear looked like. He's a nine foot
interior twenty five inch skull, about as big as they
come for an interior grizzly.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
He was just a beast.
Speaker 3 (19:41):
He had his scars on his nose, a big bite
mark out of his rear, old scars on his shoulder,
and he's just an old bruiser who had been beat
up many a times.
Speaker 2 (19:52):
And it was so exciting.
Speaker 3 (19:54):
You know, he is paws or the size of my
head and just to be able to get up on
him and see this magnificent animal.
Speaker 4 (20:01):
It was.
Speaker 2 (20:02):
It was so cool. It was so cool, what a bear.
Speaker 1 (20:08):
And I gotta say congrats to Jennet. That is a
crazy track to get over to where that bear was.
Whenever she was talking about what all it would take
with crossing the river and going over to where that
bear was, and how the outfitter wasn't really wanting to
go over there and has only done it once in
the past, you knew the story was going to be
(20:31):
pretty epic, and it had to be a pretty good
bear for the outfitter to be willing to go to
that area. But Congrass channel a huge bruiser. But as
most hunters know, it's not over until it's over. They
still got to break the bear down and get it
back to camp. And then now they're tagged out and
(20:53):
they got to get back home so we can go
back to Jennifer a bit, and then I got a
few questions for.
Speaker 2 (21:05):
Brandon.
Speaker 3 (21:06):
Hike back down, got to us, and what seemed to
be under an hour. The guy, the twenty seven year old,
looks like a big, huge, six foot five football player.
He's just a strapping beast of a guy. And we
got to work on the bear skinned it. You know,
when they do that, they take the skull out, and
they even take the paw bone, the handbones out, the
feet bones out, everything, every ounce of that bear out.
(21:28):
And so yet you can pack up the hide and
the skull, and you know, the hide weighs anywhere from
eighty to one hundred pounds, and it's just an incredible animal.
And so got all packed up, made our way back
down to the river, stopped to have dinner at the
river because now we're probably sixteen hours into the hunt,
into that day's hunt, and so we stopped, made a
(21:49):
peak meal at the river, had got some calories in us,
crossed back across the river. We weren't on our same
line that we crossed on, and this team it was
even a little bit deeper as we went across. But
and then just hike back up to camp and from
the time we left camp to when we got back
to camp with the bear was twenty hours.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
Yeah, it's a full day. Yeah. It was absolutely incredible.
Speaker 3 (22:13):
And then he said, as we're unloading everything, we're packing
our bear, putting our bear in the snow bank right
by camp. He said, I got good news and bad news.
The good news is we're going to get out tomorrow morning.
It's fog was coming in. We could tell that it
was going to be a really bad day ten. Day
ten was supposed to be super foggy.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
The pilot's going to come get us all. We're all
going to get out.
Speaker 3 (22:31):
The bad news is, you guys have two hours to
get some sleep and then we're packing camp and hiking
back to the airstrip. It was an adventure like none
I've ever had before. It was probably the most physically
challenging hunt in my life. This was next level. Even
though you had days where he didn't really burn a
whole lot of calories, you're sitting there glassing the whole day,
(22:51):
just the three days that we dropped off back to camp,
and it's sleeping on the ground, and it was just
it is really hard to discrubebe the epic noss for
lack of a better word, of this style of bear hunt.
I couldn't be more grateful for Lance and Brandon to
just have their knowledge and their help. And they were
so fun in camp. And you know, they've got every
(23:14):
single grizzly story that you've ever heard, they've probably witnessed themselves,
you know, and we talked about Yeah, we talked about
predation a ton because it's so misunderstood. I mean, recently,
there was an article in the Massoulian and some gale
wrote it and it was Grizzly hunting is nothing but
a trophy hunt, was the title of the article. And
(23:36):
they couldn't be any further from the truth. There's another
area in Alaska where they helicoptered eighty one grizzlies this
year because they're trying so desperately hard to save this
particular caribou herd and it you know, anyone who says
nature balances a self out is so ignorant, and it
(23:56):
simply doesn't work like that. We are a part of nature.
Definitely screwed things up in the past. It is our
responsibility to make them right, and we want all animals.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
To be here for the future.
Speaker 3 (24:09):
You know, the carib with the muskox, the reindeer, everything,
and they just need to be managed like any and
because this style hunt is really hard. Like so the
natives can come hunt grizzly anytime they want, but logistically
they don't. It's incredibly challenging. They're going to need a
plane to get in here. The only way they ever
(24:30):
get in to this area. Lance was saying, was by snowmobile.
And you know by snowmobile, they're the grizzlies are hibernating.
So it's a it's they just become overpopulated and they
need to be managed.
Speaker 2 (24:42):
And uh, yeah it was a hunt I'll never forget.
Speaker 1 (24:45):
Yeah, it sounds like a crazy adventure. And yea, John
let you John, lets you tag along.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
He let me tagle, He let me tag on. And
the funny thing is it's.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
Just dumb luck that my bear was bigger than his.
You know, I would have gladly traded. But it's funny
we're both having them fully boy, fully body mounted. He
wants right, Yeah, isn't hers? He wants upright? I want
on all fours. So yeah, we're pretty excited to get
those back next year. And yeah, you know, being being
(25:14):
a bear gal. You know, I that Grizzly was my
nineteenth bear that I've taken, obviously my first Grizzly, but
just to have that experience was amazing, and it was
I felt like, you know, a kid in a candy.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
Store just talking bears all week. You know, it was.
Speaker 3 (25:28):
Amazing and I really hope someday I might get to
do it again, maybe on Kodiak for Brown Bear. But yeah,
if anyone, I mean, you know, life is short, take
advantage of the opportunity. If you have to put money
down for five years, save a date, and start putting
money down on the hunt.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
I know they're expensive. I get it. You know, I
am not the typical sheep hunter.
Speaker 3 (25:49):
That was one I drew. I'm not the typical grizzly hunter.
They're super expensive. But life is short. If it's a
dream of yours, go after it, start saving for it.
Because I don't. I'll find it very hard to believe
that John and I could ever top that adventure.
Speaker 2 (26:04):
For the rest of our lives.
Speaker 3 (26:05):
Wherever we travel, whether it's a hunt, whether we go
to Europe, I don't think we are ever going to
be able to top that Grizzly adventure.
Speaker 1 (26:13):
Yeah, yeah, And it's one of those things that you
have to do why you can physically do it. Some
people might think that they should start on lesser adventures
and just like eventually whenever they could spend the money
or have it go and do those types of adventures.
But our bodies have a big timeline on them, you know.
Speaker 3 (26:32):
And yeah, yeah, for sure, I'm not getting any younger,
no doubt. And Lance and I are the exact same age,
So I was thinking, Okay, at least I have that
in my quarter, you know, the outfitter's diage. Oh no,
he was basically a mouth vat. He is one of
the strongest guys. He and Brandon together, we're just beasts,
and I'm I'm happy John and I survived.
Speaker 1 (26:54):
These bear outfitters. A lot of times they're just nothing
but solid muscle, you know. Also hound hunters. I mean,
those guys are incredibly in shape. You could look at
a guy and think that and think that you could
keep up with him, Like he might not have the
physique of looking like an athlete, but some of these
big old fellas can get up and stay way ahead
(27:18):
of you two, you know, like the no guys that
do it, you know, day in and day out, and
I think it's a lot of it is that harshness
of environment. You know, if you especially in the mountainous areas,
these guys running black bears with hounds, like they have
to go in to where that tree is most of
the time.
Speaker 3 (27:37):
You know, yeah, yeah, exactly, no houndsmen. Are you typically
in great shape?
Speaker 2 (27:43):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (27:43):
You know, book the hunt, and you know when you
go to a grizzly hunt, you're gonna need an outfitter.
You know, you have to legally have an outfitter with you.
And my recommendation if you're able to book a hunt
like this is to ask the outfitter for a workout regime.
You know, I John and I have a gym in
our house, would work out a ton. I still felt unprepared.
I wish so I was rocking with forty pounds on
(28:07):
my back on the treadmill. Every other day, I half
hour rucking and then lifting weights. And I probably should
have done that. Last two months before the hunt, I
probably should have done an hour a rucking just because
it was so and the tundra it's like walking through
snow banks. It's just so or on the sand anyone
knows if you're on the sand, how much more challenging
(28:28):
walking is in thick sand, not right where the waves
come in. I'm talking thick sand. That's kind of what
tundra hiking is like. And then you add on that
inclient and stuff. But I would, yeah, follow the outfitters instructions.
They've been there, done that so much. Even like I
looked at the Atlance's gearlest and even though I looked
at the gearlest, I'm like, yep, I got a sleeping pad.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
I got a sleeping bag.
Speaker 3 (28:52):
The one thing I wish I would have done and
listened to him is he had recommendations of a sleeping
pad and a sleeping bag, and I'm like, I got
my zero degree.
Speaker 2 (28:59):
Bay, I'm good. No, I was freezing.
Speaker 3 (29:03):
They use Lance and Brandon use climbing bags like for
climbers who climb Everest.
Speaker 2 (29:08):
That's next level gear.
Speaker 3 (29:10):
And he did say there's a padout I can't remember
the manufacturer, a sleeping padout that's literally four or five
inches thick, and he said it's a game changer. And
so anyway, pay attention to the outfit or what they
have to say, but life is short.
Speaker 2 (29:26):
Go after those Adventures.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
So what made you and John go after such a
difficult hunt in a for an interier grizzly because you know,
a lot of guys you could do like a boat
based hunt, like there's different. I mean, they can they
can bait for grizz up in Alaska. Two. So what
was the driver for making a decision to do a
(29:50):
really physically demanding, you know, for plane into interior.
Speaker 3 (29:56):
You're right there, there are so many different styles of grizzly. Really,
the one thing that made him want this hunt was
Lance was Lance Kromberger, the outfitter. He had met Lance
at the Wild Sheep Foundation banquet at their annual Big
you Know expo, and he started talking with him, started
(30:16):
to watch a lot of Lance's videos Free Lance Outdoors
I think is his company name, and may have some
of those on YouTube or on different channels, but started
watching those and he just wanted a true interior style
of hunt where you had to get dropped off by
a cub.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
That's the style of hunt he really wanted.
Speaker 3 (30:34):
And really, this particular outfitter we chose because John had
tons of friends who've gone with Lance in the past
and had the exact kind of experience that I just described,
and it couldn't have been any better. It really couldn't.
It was, you know, and you are at the mercy
of the weather with flying in, flying out, with glassing
(30:56):
and fog and rain that kind of thing, and I'm.
Speaker 2 (30:59):
Glad we had it all.
Speaker 3 (30:59):
We had some rain, we had some fog, we had cold,
we had a little little bit of snow showers. But
I'm kind of glad we had it all. When you
get back, it just adds to the adventure.
Speaker 4 (31:08):
You know.
Speaker 1 (31:08):
One of the most important things that I think people
overlook is camp dynamics. And so oftentimes people are focused
so much on what they can get out of the
hunt as far as like what size of bear they
can bring them back, But it's really important to find
the right outfitter that that you pretty much just jive
with because you're going to be around that person for
(31:31):
you know, in most bear hunts maybe five or six
days and they're calling the shots, like you have to
make sure that you trust them and that you know
you can take orders from them like that. They're just
you got to make sure that your personalities jive well.
And it's not just about you know what it is
(31:51):
that you're after.
Speaker 2 (31:53):
Yeah, oh, that's so important.
Speaker 3 (31:54):
Lance had brought that up actually when we were having
our conversations in the cooked tent. In that one, he
almost intervened people for the hunt he's booked up for
the next you know, I don't know how many years
on end, but he literally interviews people to see if
sort of you know, how serious they are, if they've
got what it takes to do the hunt, what their
(32:14):
expectations are. And I think he's such a veteran and
he's I'm sure sort of tailored his questioning to the
hunters as well to make sure that that there is
a good bond, like you said, that you're going to
get along, that the outfitter can meet expectations, all of that.
Speaker 1 (32:31):
You know, So whenever you and John talk about it,
like what's the the thing that comes up the most.
Speaker 3 (32:39):
Definitely in the ten days we were there nine and
a half, John's bear that in your face, Like we
talk about that every day.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
Still.
Speaker 3 (32:50):
The hit, just the way it went down was so
awesome because it was thirty six yards when he shot
his bear. He shot it at thirty six yards and
he might have ran ten yards, you know, and just
the in your face adrenaline, and it wasn't charging us,
you know, like you've seen those videos right of them.
It wasn't charging, but it was walking kind of past
(33:10):
to figure out like what we are.
Speaker 2 (33:12):
And I don't care what anybody says.
Speaker 3 (33:14):
Even though there's two guns because Lance has gone, John
has a gun, I've got the camera.
Speaker 2 (33:18):
It's still intimidating. It's still a rush.
Speaker 3 (33:21):
And so that and then the whole the last day
of my hunt to twenty hours of just crossing the river.
And you know, I've I've had my neighbors over for
dinner and they had fifty thousand questions or I've talked
to people online about it. Really a lot of the
questions had to do with like how do you warm
up after crossing the river?
Speaker 2 (33:41):
How do you get the hide and everything out? Like
do you eat the meat? You know, everything like that.
Speaker 3 (33:46):
But John and I when we're sitting in the truck
talking about the hunt, it's about they have his close
encounter and crossing the river.
Speaker 1 (33:53):
Yeah, yeah, cool. Well I think we're gonna wrap this
one up. But thanks Jenna absolutely anytime.
Speaker 2 (34:00):
Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (34:02):
All Right, that's a wrap another one down. Well, you
can watch Jana's Hunt for a Pooh, the Idaho Bated
Hunt on Carbon TV now and it will be in
the upcoming September October issue of Bear Hunting Magazine. The
Hunt with John this interior grizzly hunt will be in
(34:23):
the magazine eventually. You can catch John going after his
bear on August fifteenth on Carbon TV, and then you
can catch Jana's hunt a month later September fifteenth on
Carbon TV. I'm sure it's gonna be a great watch.
Until next time, stay classy.
Speaker 4 (34:43):
Thank you for listening. Though Bear Hunting Magazine Hunt Cast
is recorded by Bear Hunting Magazine and produced by Mountain
Gravity Media. Be sure leave us a five star review
on iTunes and keep guarding the gate.
Speaker 1 (35:01):
No
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